


Jack of Spades

by glorious_spoon



Category: Iron Fist (TV)
Genre: Dreamsharing, Gen, Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-14
Updated: 2020-04-14
Packaged: 2021-03-01 21:26:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,334
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23653813
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/glorious_spoon/pseuds/glorious_spoon
Summary: The silence seems to swallow his voice. There’s no answer, and it’s only then that he admits to himself how much he was hoping for one. Of course it wasn’t going to be that easy.
Relationships: Ward Meachum & Danny Rand
Comments: 10
Kudos: 26
Collections: Hurt Comfort Exchange 2020





	Jack of Spades

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Sholio](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sholio/gifts).



> This is a treat fic for **Sholio** , for the prompt _Entering a dream/nightmare to help the dreamer_. I hope you enjoy!

The lobby of Rand Enterprises is empty, but it’s the kind of emptiness that seems haunted. Phantom footsteps click across the marble floor; dark shapes move in the corners of Danny’s vision and vanish when he tries to look at them directly. He shivers, though it’s not cold in here. It’s not warm, either. It’s not really _anything._

When he looks down at himself, he finds that he’s wearing the hoodie and loose sweatpants that he had on the first time he walked through these doors after his return to New York. His dirty bare feet are splayed on the polished floor. He rubs a hand over his jaw and finds it scruffy. It’s almost enough to make him smile.

Out loud, he says, “So, is that you or me?”

The silence seems to swallow his voice. There’s no answer, and it’s only then that he admits to himself how much he was hoping for one. Of course it wasn’t going to be that easy.

The red string tied loosely around his wrist trails behind him as he approaches the bank of elevators, endlessly unspooling back. This has to be the right way. There’s no part of this building that’s a home for Ward, not the way it was for Danny once upon a time, but he’s here. Somewhere.

Finding him will probably be the easy part. Convincing him, on the other hand—

Well, that’s why Danny’s here. He steps through the gleaming doors, ignoring the shade that flickers in the corner of the elevator, and hits the button for the top floor executive suites. As the elevator starts to rise, there’s a faint tug at his wrist before the string goes slack again. Danny rubs his knuckles against the rough narrow twist of it, looks down to where it disappears between the doors and imagines the other end winding away into darkness.

He really hopes this is the right way.

Stepping out at the top floor is like stepping fifteen years back in time. The furniture is out of date, and the portraits by the glass doors show his dad and Harold Meachum, smiling benignly out at their deserted empire like a pair of young princes frozen in time. Danny makes a face and forces himself to keep moving. His bare feet make no sound on the carpeted floor.

The executive suite is as deserted as the lobby was, and even the shades seem to have abandoned him. He moves past the desk outside the offices; instead of the small, tastefully framed photo of her baby nephew that Katie keeps on the otherwise immaculate surface, there are a pair of potted cacti perched next to a boxy desktop that must date back to the early 2000’s.

It’s not that much of a surprise, then, when he slips through the door of what was once Harold’s office to find Ward sitting on the floor by the tall picture windows looking barely any older than he did when Danny’s plane crashed in the mountains.

Even as a child, Ward always loomed large in Danny’s memory. Right now, though, he looks hunched and small, a lanky half-grown boy in an expensive suit. He’s playing solitaire there on the carpet, and the soft shuffle of the cards as he deals is the only sound to be heard. Danny swallows hard against the lump in his throat and circles the room until he’s in front of Ward. The string tightens around his wrist again, and this time it doesn’t completely loosen.

“Yeah, okay, I got it,” he murmurs, like Colleen is going to be able to hear him or something. But still: message received. They’re on a deadline here.

Ward glances up when he speaks. He doesn’t look afraid, which is something, but his brow furrows in an expression of impatient annoyance that’s...unsettling, to see on his much younger face. “You’re not supposed to be here.”

“Yeah, trust me, I know,” Danny says, and indicates the carpet. “Can I sit?”

Ward shrugs but doesn’t refuse. Deciding to take that as encouraging, Danny folds himself down opposite Ward. The playing cards form a barrier between them. “Do you know who I am?”

“I don’t care who you are. You’re not supposed to be here.”

“I’m Danny. Danny Rand.”

Ward looks up at him again. His dark eyes are wary in his too-young face. “Danny Rand is dead.”

“Yeah, I guess you would think that, huh.” Ward looks back down at the cards without answering. When he deals, the face card is the jack of spades. He sets it under the exposed red queen and deals again.

There’s probably some symbolism in that, but Danny doesn’t have background knowledge—or, more importantly, the time—to figure it out. “Ward. I’m not dead. I promise. And I don’t really have time to explain, but you need to come with me.”

“Like hell I will.”

“Yeah, I don’t know what I was expecting,” Danny sighs. He probably _could_ haul Ward off by force, especially now, but that’ll just end up with both of them trapped here. Ward has to come willingly, which means that Danny has to convince him. Somehow.

“Look,” he says, changing tactics, “do you know how you got here?”

“This is my company.”

“Yeah, I didn’t mean— _your_ company? So Harold is dead.”

Something flickers across Ward’s face, there and then gone before Danny can read it. He can guess, though. Dead, and back again, and worse than ever. And Ward, all of eighteen, holding it together with the sheer bloody-minded stubbornness that’ll carry him through the next twelve years of hell. “Yeah. So?”

“I’m sorry,” Danny says sincerely.

Ward scoffs and deals the last three cards, coming up with nothing useful, then picks up the messy stack, neatens it, and starts dealing again. “Why, did you know him?”

“Yeah, I did. I’m Danny Rand, remember?”

“Danny Rand has been dead for three years.” Ward’s hands still, briefly, though. Like maybe he’s unsure. Just briefly, though, and then he deals again. And again, and again, until he’s reached the end of the deck. The game is lost, but instead of sweeping it up and reshuffling the deck, he just starts dealing again. “You’re a little behind the times.”

“You have no idea,” Danny mutters. The string tugs again, digging painfully under his wrist, and when he looks down he can see a raw red welt beginning to form. “Ward just—listen to me. This isn’t real. None of this is real.”

“Yeah, right. What, are we stuck in the Matrix?”

“More like a dream,” Danny tells him. He starts to reach out, then stops when Ward flinches. “ _Your_ dream. This isn’t—you’re thirty-two years old. Harold has been dead, _really_ dead, for two years. You were helping me look into a cult that’s been drugging people and trapping them in dreams until they die. They caught us, you took the hit for me— _hey._ ” Ward is dealing through the useless deck, faster and faster, the cards falling to scatter on the carpet at his feet. His hands are trembling. Danny wants to reach for him, to stop him, but he’s not going to make that mistake again. The lights overhead flicker and don’t completely brighten again, shadows lingering in the corners of the room. “Please. Please believe me. We’re almost out of time.”

 _“If it starts to fray, I’m bringing you back,”_ Colleen told him at the start of all this, in a tone that brooked no disagreement. _“I’m not leaving you in there to die with him.”_

It won’t come to that. He can’t let it come to that. “Ward, listen. Do you remember how you got here?”

“I was—” Ward stops, shakes his head. Sets the cards down, finally, and rests his hands on his bony knees. His voice fractures slightly. Outside the window, the panoramic view of lower Manhattan fades, obscured by a roiling gray like storm clouds. “I was waiting for Joy.”

Danny winces. “I don’t think she’s coming. Do you remember how you got up here? Did you take the elevator?”

“Yeah, of course I…” Ward trails off. “Of course I did. I must have.”

“Which one?” He’s groping for the right words, trying to keep the desperation out of his voice, but some of it must get through, because Ward glances up at him again, a quick nervous look. “Which elevator, Ward?”

“I—I don’t. I don’t know.”

The cord tightens painfully, and Danny looks to see it pulled up through the open door as tightly as a guitar string, the fibers stretching visibly. Beyond that, the hallway and the bank of elevators have faded into a darkness that seems to be inching closer with every breath. He leans forward, his heart in his throat. “Please. _Please_ , I know you have no reason to trust me right now, but I’m asking you to take a leap of faith.”

Ward is maybe the least likely person Danny knows to take a leap of faith on anything or anyone. It’s all he has, though. There’s no proof he can offer here, in this bleak corner of Ward’s own mind that even now is beginning to fragment around the edges, becoming dark and unreal.

“I _can’t._ ”

“You can. I promise, you can.” Danny reaches out to him, palm open, imploring. “Come back with me. Come home.”

There’s a sharp jerk, and as the world around him comes apart like wet paper he feels—he thinks he feels—warm fingers wrap around his hand. He clings as tightly as he can, and then he’s falling into a dim and suffocating darkness.

* * *

He surges upright, gasping, and nearly topples off the bed. Colleen catches him before he can hit the floor. Her hands are firm and grounding, and Danny clings to her like a drowning man, the warmth of her body and the citrus smell of her shampoo filling his senses, anchoring him back into reality.

“I got you,” she murmurs, steady as a rock even though he can hear the frightened waver in her voice. He can feel the sting against his wrist where the string snapped, like a lash from a whip. “I got you.”

“I’m okay,” Danny gasps against her hair. And then, “Ward? Is he—”

His other hand is still tangled up with Ward’s, but Ward isn’t moving. Dread rises up to choke him, but before he can give voice to it, Ward rolls his head against the pillow, wrinkles his nose, and opens his eyes. He stares up at the ceiling for a long moment, then levers himself stiffly into a half-seated position against the headboard. His dazed and baffled gaze sweeps over them without comprehension.

“What the hell,” he says eventually, rustily.

"Ward," Danny breathes out, dizzy with relief, as Colleen releases him. “You’re back.”

“Didn’t realize I was gone.” He straightens a little more, then winces and stops, half-hunched over like his whole body is a bruise. “What happened? What the hell am I doing in your _bed_?”

Danny laughs a little, breathless and cracked. “Um. It’s a long story.”

“Start at the beginning, then,” Ward says, and pulls himself the rest of the way upright. “The last thing I remember is you chasing those guys into the warehouse by yourself, like a total _idiot_ —”

“Yeah, and you went after me, so what does that make you?”

“As far as I’m concerned, you’re both idiots,” Colleen interjects. She hesitates, then reaches over to pat Ward gingerly on the shoulder. “I’m glad you’re okay. I’ll go let Misty know.”

She squeezes Danny’s hand again, then gets off the bed. The snapped red cord trails from her wrist as she leaves the room, pulling the door shut behind her. Ward stares after her, then at Danny. “Misty’s involved in this too?”

“Yeah, we sort of… kidnapped one of the cultists. She’s been keeping an eye on him.”

“Oh, of course,” Ward says incredulously.

“Unofficially,” Danny adds. He digs his fingers into the knotted cord around his own wrist, but it’s so tight that he eventually has to tug it loose with his teeth. He finally pulls it off, drops it on the bed, and looks up to find Ward staring at him with a furrowed brow. “What?”

“Did you…” Ward picks up the string, delicately and a little nervously, like he’s handling a live snake. “What happened?”

“They hit you with one of those darts. You’ve been unconscious for…” He trails off with a shudder. “Most of a day. We finally, uh, _convinced_ one of them to tell us how to get you out.”

“Get me out. Of my own dream. Where I was trapped due to a magical roofie dart.”

“Yeah.”

“That’s insane. You realize that, right? Your life is insane.”

“Sorry,” Danny offers.

“Uh, thank you, I guess.” Ward scrubs his hands over his face, then up into his hair. “So you, what, went into my mind to track me down?”

“Yeah.” Danny rubs his wrist, where there’s a thin abraded line. “Colleen anchored me here and pulled us both out. You don’t remember?”

“Not really.” And then, “Jesus, what a nightmare that must have been.”

He sounds like he’s joking, mostly, but Danny shakes his head. He’s not quite ready to joke about it, not now, looking at the wary half-smile on Ward’s face and seeing the echo of his younger self there. “No. No, it was just—” He breaks off, thinking of those long empty hallways, the flickering shadows and echoing silence. _Lonely. It was so, so lonely._ “It was fine. How are you feeling?”

“Like I got hit by a truck and then backed over.” Ward eyes him with a narrow and suspicious look. “You’re going to try and hug me now, aren’t you?”

Danny laughs, a little wetly. “Yeah. Yeah, I am.”

“Lucky me,” Ward mutters, but when Danny leans over to do exactly that, Ward doesn’t even make a token effort to shove him off.

**Author's Note:**

> In traditional American cartomancy, the Jack of Spades signifies a messenger or a person charged with bearing of intelligence, in a capacity of trust.


End file.
